Negotiate a real deal and compare the outcome with your preparation.
Open your last phone, broadband or gym bill and find one thing you already pay for that you could pay less for, or get more from. Choose something you would be fine walking away from, and plan to negotiate it this month.
Until now you have prepared negotiations on paper and rehearsed them with partners. This time the negotiation is real: it happens this month, with real money and a real person on the other side. Keep the stakes low on purpose, so that a mistake costs you little. The aim is to run the whole method once, from preparation to review. Allow about 30 minutes for preparation and review, plus however long the negotiation itself takes.
Good candidates include a phone or broadband plan near the end of its contract, a gym membership, a quote for aircon servicing or a household repair, a rent renewal if one is coming up, or the price of a second-hand item you're buying or selling. Picking something you could walk away from keeps the stakes low and gives you a real BATNA to rely on, because you already know what you'll do if there's no deal.
Lesson 3.4, Complete your preparation worksheet, has the full version. For a small negotiation, a shortened worksheet of about half a page is enough, with a line or two for each of these items:
Interests: what you need, and what the other side probably needs BATNA: what you will do if there is no deal Reservation point and target Your opening, and the reason for it One concession you are willing to make, and what you will ask for in return The tactic you expect, and how you will respond
Priya, from Lesson 8.1, Renewing or signing a lease, chose her mobile plan. Her two-year contract ends next month and she pays S$40 a month (an example figure, as are all of Priya's numbers). A competing telco offers similar data for S$30 a month, and her own provider's website shows a SIM-only plan at S$35.
On her worksheet, she wrote that her interests are low cost and keeping her number, and that the provider wants to keep a customer who pays on time. Her BATNA is to switch to the competitor at S$30 and port her number. Switching would take an afternoon, so she set her reservation point at S$32: she would stay for S$32 or less, and anything higher isn't worth staying for. Her target is S$30.
Her opening is to ask them to match S$30, naming the competitor's plan. Her concession is to accept a new 12-month contract if they match the price. She expected the agent to say "this offer is only available today", and planned to reply that she would compare and call back.
You can call, visit or message, whichever suits you. Keep the worksheet in front of you the whole time. While you talk, note three things: the first offer you hear, your counter, and the final terms. Write those three down straight after the negotiation, before you forget the details. If you reach a deal, ask for the agreed terms to be confirmed in writing by email or SMS.
Priya called the retention line. The agent's first offer was S$35 on a new 24-month contract. Priya cited the competitor's similar data at S$30 and asked them to match it. The agent said S$32 was the lowest available. She then used her planned concession and asked whether S$30 was possible on a 12-month contract. After a pause and a check with a supervisor, the agent agreed to S$30 on 24 months, with a small data bonus. Priya accepted and asked for the terms to be confirmed by email or SMS.
Write a half-page review within a day of the negotiation. Start with the outcome in numbers, putting your before and after terms side by side. Then write what worked and what you would change. Finally, compare the result with your worksheet: check whether you landed between your reservation point and your target, whether the tactic you expected showed up, and what surprised you.
Priya's outcome was a saving of S$10 a month (S$40 - S$30), which comes to S$10 x 24 months = S$240 over the contract. Under what worked, she wrote that naming the competitor's plan and price gave her a criterion the agent couldn't dismiss, and that her real BATNA meant she didn't have to treat the S$32 offer as final. Under what she would change, she noted that she accepted 24 months when she had hoped for 12, and that next time she would hold the contract term as a separate issue so it couldn't move at the end of the deal.
A negotiation that ends with no deal still counts, as long as you walked away for a reason your worksheet would support. You are done when you have held one real negotiation, recorded the first offer, your counter and the final terms, and written a review that gives the gain in dollars, what worked and what you would change.
Now pick your item, fill in your half-page worksheet, hold the negotiation, and write your half-page review within a day.
Negotiate one real everyday deal. Then write half a page on how you prepared, what the outcome was and what you learned.
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